Dave G suggests that New Hampshire moving up its primary to (perhaps) December 6th would help Romney.
First of all, I doubt it will be that early and I certainly hope not. It’s my hope that Secretary of State Gardener get over his pique about Nevada holding its caucus 4 days after New Hampshire. In both 1996 and 2000, Delaware held an actual primary four days after New Hampshire and it did little to dampen New Hampshire’s impact.
But should the primary occur in New Hampshire will it help Romney? If you view politics as a football game, then the answer is yes. If your team is up by two touchdowns and 7 1/2 minutes come off the clock, the chances of your team winning, go up exponentially.
However, it’s more complicated in politics. It does help Romney in that it lessens the ability of his opponents to raise money to compete in New Hampshire and organize. It also lessens the window for Romney to make a gaffe or Rick Perry to recover from his errors. ‘
Indeed, if this whole thing hurts anyone, it certainly hurts Rick Perry, who had no idea how late he was getting into this thing when he got in.
However, all candidates who have been doing the work in Iowa and New Hampshire, moving the primary up won’t have a big impact. Not all time in a Presidential campaign is created equal. While political junkies of all stripes have been paying rapt attention, the average voter hasn’t. And a primary campaign reaches a point when voters decide to engage the process.
If we take a look back at 2007-08, this is backed up. Romney had taken a lead in New Hampshire in May and had led (usually by double digits) through December 17th. The last five polls that ended on December 17th had Romney +12, Romney +15, Romney +13, Romney +13, and Romney +12. McCain began to move as New Hampshire voters became engaged with the next polls being Romney +4, a tie, Romney +7, and Romney +3. The LA Times/Bloomberg released an outlier poll on December 26 that had Romney +14, but the next two results were tied. Then on December 31st, McCain took the lead and with the exception of two polls, consistently held it until he won the Primary.
All that happened is that the voter engagement period will occur sooner. Another impact on this race if Iowa and New Hampshire occur in 2011, more three weeks out from the next contest in Nevada, they could diminish their role in the presidential process by blunting the momentum of the winner. A mid-december win in New Hampshire will be drowned out by the Holidays in the rest of the country. Already, the March 6 Super Tuesday and February Dead Zone (with only two non-binding Caucuses and two primaries occurring) threaten to weaken Iowa and New Hampshire’s power, being too early could imperil it even further and allow a candidate who wins neither state to take the nomination.
October 8th, 2011 at 8:14 pm
I think Romney is helped more by IA-NH-NV-SC than by NH-one month space-IA-NV-SC…
October 8th, 2011 at 8:14 pm
Moving up the primaries may help individual candidates, but it really angers the voters. People want to enjoy the Christmas season without having politics as the focus!
October 8th, 2011 at 8:15 pm
Maybe since Romney is so powerful that he can make NV move their date, he can make NH go on Jan. 10
October 8th, 2011 at 8:15 pm
#2..Amen
October 8th, 2011 at 8:19 pm
Pro of helping Romney: New Hampshire is more likely to give Romney momentum than Iowa is…and Romney isn’t doing that badly (in fact, leading) in Iowa as it is. Win in New Hampshire makes a win in Iowa seem far more likely. In addition, if New Hampshire were to vote in December, and voters promptly started paying more attention to their Christmas lists than to politics, it could prevent candidates from knocking down the edge Mitt would gain from winning the first contest. It would also allow Romney to move his operation to Iowa full time. Win in New Hampshire, followed by a win in Iowa, means a win in South Carolina, and thats the ballgame.
Con of helping Romney: a month is an eternity in politics, and if Iowa decides to let New Hampshire go first…VERY first, then they might not need to hold their contest until the middle of January. Thats as much as five weeks between the two, and it could break up the snowball effect that winning a prior contest creates.
In any case, the talk of not just December primaries, but EARLY December primaries makes it clear we need primary reform on a national level.
Here’s my proposal…start the second week of march or so, continue until mid-june. Take some time off for Independence Day vacations, hold the conventions at the end of july, followed by a short break for the Olympics in the beginning of August, and the general election can kick off mid-August.
http://img695.imageshack.us/img695/1198/primarycalendar.jpg
October 8th, 2011 at 8:19 pm
2
Right, but Christmas will involve politics unless the first contests aren’t until February, realistically.
October 8th, 2011 at 8:21 pm
5
Your plan looks good on its face, but the problem is actually getting it to happen as planned…
October 8th, 2011 at 8:26 pm
“Your plan looks good on its face, but the problem is actually getting it to happen as planned…”
Which is why I’ve been advocating national legislation on the issue. The early states should actually be pretty happy with my plan – it preserves their role…something that might not happen otherwise. The largest states can also probably be talked into supporting it, since IL+CA+TX+FL+NY is a MASSIVE chunk of the delegates, and more candidates are likely to stay in that long (giving these states a say) as long as they can pick up a few states before then. The trick is convincing the middle states to accept their role.
But by having the smallest states go first, and the largest states go last, you can’t even wrap up the nomination, EVEN WINNING 60% of all delegates, until the 10th or 11th week.
National strategies, regional strategies, early state strategies, etc. – it all evens out.
October 8th, 2011 at 8:31 pm
It would almost be suicidal for New Hampshire to go in 2011. Any sort of win would be cancelled out by the holidays; people simply won’t care about politics over the Christmas holidays.
I agree that we need massive reform of the primary calendar. The Ohio Plan that went around last year made sense to me. Basically break the country into 5 separate groups (with the exception of the first 4 states). A group of small states would go after the first 4 (with no where near enough delegates to make a big mathematical difference), and then the rest of the states would rotate each year.
October 8th, 2011 at 8:34 pm
#9…Ditto on the Ohio plan.
In a democratic republic like America, are we all that surprised that the other states don’t feel it’s fair that the same states always go first and have a disproporationate say in who wins the nomination?…
October 8th, 2011 at 8:38 pm
I liked the ohio plan, but it looked too regionalized to me – the Upper plains were voting first, followed by a belt of states in the south and another around the great lakes, and then the west coast and the Potomac region.
The reason I put together my plan to throw out there for people to debate was that it took a very similar concept – having smaller states go, then larger states – and got rid of the element which had regions voting together…in my plan, states are still divided into regions, but the regions don’t vote together.
October 8th, 2011 at 8:39 pm
#5:
Matt, I like the way you think overall. My only concern is the travel part, but unless you go to a Rotating Regional system, that will be a problem. I’d also say that it would make sense to have DC vote on Super Tuesday along with Maryland and Virginia. And have the territories to vote during week 8.
But like I said, I appreciate the thinking.
My opinion on the big problem with our primary system is that our problem isn’t that we can’t find a reasonable way to do it. Your plan is great. I like the Delaware plan and the Ohio plan, rotating regional primaries could work. That’s not the problem. It’s that there are too many politicians willing to make the process worse to give themselves an opportunity to gain political capital. I think had we stuck to the original RNC plan, things would be much better.
I think the one thing the RNC should change for 2016 and forward, if they do anything else is to state that any Caucus or strawpoll held before February 1st is non-binding and that the state will have to choose delegates another way such as at the state convention.
October 8th, 2011 at 8:44 pm
#11:
I wasn’t aware of precisely which states were in each group, but we don’t need regionalism. After all Super Tuesday which is partially responsible for the front-loading gone mad, was started as a Southern power play.
The small states to large states plan could, I think be unfair to the bigger states. The momentum factor would be so overwhelming that the large states would effectively have to ratify the decisions of the small states.
Actually, to hell with it, let’s just cancel all the primaries and go back to the days of the brockered convention. (I’m mostly joking)
October 8th, 2011 at 8:46 pm
The problem I have with the regional primaries is that it would almost certainly give the region going first the major say in who becomes the nominee…and since both parties would hold their primaries at the same time, you’d likely end up with two midwesterners against each other, then two southerners against each other, then two people from the Northeast.
four or five regions gives each one a major say MAYBE every 16 or 20 years….and thats without factoring in years where there is an incumbent President.
Sure, a moral-values-candidate from the south would have been great in 2004…but not so much in 2008, or 2012. And a northeastern economic guru might be good when the economy is failing, like now….but maybe eight years from now, things are fine, and we need to focus on the social front more.
There’s no way to guarentee the candidates who would get the edge would be the best fit for a given year.
October 8th, 2011 at 8:49 pm
“The small states to large states plan could, I think be unfair to the bigger states. The momentum factor would be so overwhelming that the large states would effectively have to ratify the decisions of the small states.”
While the small states would certainly have more candidates to pick from, and hence get to whittle down the field, the largest states would still get to pick from the biggest 2-4 names…consider that if we had used this plan in 2008, its very possible that McCain, Romney, and Huckabee would ALL have survived until at least the last contests….thats a pretty big prize.
I mean, sure, New Yorkers won’t get to vote for the bachmann, santorum, or huntsman-types….but how many do you think will really complain?
October 8th, 2011 at 8:51 pm
#14:
The problem of in ordinate influence for one region could be balanced out, by having the first two regions allocate delegates proportionally and then making the next two regions winner-take-all.
October 8th, 2011 at 8:55 pm
here is the map of the ohio plan:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:The_Ohio_Plan.svg
October 8th, 2011 at 9:01 pm
First, all this talk about changing the way primaries are conducted are silly. If the Party can not enforce the rules they have now, what makes any one think they can enforce some other set of rules.
Second, no one is going to set the primaries in December, that would be counter productive. Iowa is going to go Jan 3, and New Hampshire Jan 10th, take it to the bank.
Finally, this is not 2007/2008. There is no surging Huckabee, instead we have a deflating Perry. In 2007/2008 Huckabee and McCain worked together to crush Romney in the middle, that doesn’t exist in 2011/2012. Instead Perry is the one who is under attack from all sides.
Here is what you can count on.
The crazy Evangelical vote (not all Evangelical vote) will mostly go to Perry. (not enough to win Iowa, let only the nomination).
The vast majority of the voters will eventually come to Romney as the only adult in the room. As each of the 2nd and 3rd tier candidates peel off, Romney will pick up the majority of those voters.
Once it gets down to two candidates, voters tend to vote more against a candidate than for a candidate. And who ever is still standing with Romney, the vast majority of the voters will find that the only viable candidate will be Romney. The silent majority of voters do not vote for Crazy, they vote for competent.
October 8th, 2011 at 9:02 pm
“The problem of in ordinate influence for one region could be balanced out, by having the first two regions allocate delegates proportionally and then making the next two regions winner-take-all.”
Maybe…but I’m not convinced that would work. People who are going to be susceptible to momentum are going to be so in regards to the headlines, not the delegate totals.
Remember Iowa being that HUGE win for Huckabee? Yeah, he got 17 delegates to Romney’s 12 – a total difference of five out of thirty-seven.
Remember New Hampshire being that really severe blow to Romney? He got four delegates to McCain’s seven.
In fact, immediately following Iowa and New Hampshire, when Romney as viewed as barely hanging in, against the ropes, he was actually LEADING the delegate race with 24 votes, Huckabee was in second with 18, and McCain only had 10. In fact, even after McCain’s win in South Carolina…going into Florida, Romney still had 50% more delegates than he did.
But like I said, Momentum is based on headlines.
October 8th, 2011 at 9:08 pm
#18
We don’t have a surging Huckabee, but we do have a surging Herman Cain, and I think in New Hampshire, we have the makings of a surging Jon Huntsman, who is a perfect match for the state and has been rising in the polls. So, I guess if you want it that way, you can state that there’s a Cain/Huntsman conspiracy against Romney (they even where the same colored ties which should be more than enough proof should Romney lose both states again.
October 8th, 2011 at 9:09 pm
#19:
I understand what you’re saying and early momentum is key, but it’s determinate mostly because of what happened after. The difference is that a regional primary is a different animal. The reason Iowa and New Hampshire so much is that Super Tuesday was just around the corner when 24 states from all regions voting on one day with the Lion share of delegates stake in mostly winner-take-all contests.
October 8th, 2011 at 9:10 pm
#19:
The winnter-take-all vs. proportional issue is more of an issue as the primary season groes later and later. In 2008 when Hillary Clinton started making her comeback in Texas, Ohio and Pennsylvania, she still couldn’t catch up to Obama because of the proportional allocation of delegates (along with the superdelegates but that’s another issue for another time).
October 8th, 2011 at 10:16 pm
[...] The impact of moving up the Republican presidential primaries and caucuses [...]
October 9th, 2011 at 6:31 am
1. An early start, even 1/3/12, will make a mess of the timing of attacking the frontrunner. It would have to be done before 12/1/11 (IMO), meaning it would have to start in about 5 weeks. That means that the candidate doing it would already have to have firmly established his own narrative, gotten the funds to buy the media, and produced the ads by the middle of November for it to be effective. Perry would have the funds, but he is still defending himself from being a dumber/more liberal/more corrupt GWB. And after this week, a racial and religious bigot. Not the best position from which to go negative.
2. How in the world does Perry go negative on Cain at this point? After the kerfuffle over the name of his hunting camp, how does he get away with attacking the one black candidate in the race?
3. An early start makes a mess of BVP moving the religious right in IA to a single candidate. In ’08, that was possible because Huck “won” the right to be the SINGLE socon candidate and it was easy/justified to promote him in the churches and the home school networks vs. the Heathens (Giuliani, McCain, and Romney). In ’12, who is that candidate? Perry, Bachmann, Cain, Santorum, and Gingrich all qualify, with only Romney and Huntsman on the outside. How would a BVP deign to select a solitary candidate from that group to be the recipient of all of the socon vote? And, where they had more than 5 months to accomplish the coalescence, now they have less than 3 months. I expect a return to the normal socon turnout model of 2000, or about 40% of the total. There will be no urgent energy to get out to stop the non-socons.
4. Beating Obama in national head to head polls is a matter of name ID. With only 12 weeks and no money, Romney will continue to be the only candidate with the ability to argue that he can definitively beat Obama.
5. A surging Huntsman is a hologram at this point. The latest poll puts him behind Cain. Admittedly, while his own campaign is on fumes, he has the SuperPAC to back him. And he will have to do it with a 15 point gap in beating Obama vs. Romney.
6. The tighter calendar will accelerate the coalescence around Romney by the establishment, bundlers, and elected officials. They don’t have time to audition any more of the existing candidates. That means that Romney will have an even larger treasury from which to run his campaign in IA, as well as NH, SC, and FL. Combined with his SuperPAC (which should be swollen by big establishment backers) and his own money, he will outspend the pack combined through Super Tuesday.
7. IA and NV are caucuses, which require additional time and staff to organize. Other than Romney, Perry is the only one with enough money to do more than pray for a spontaneous turnout.
8. Unless Santorum gets BVP’s endorsement, he will not get the traction he needs. (I personally am coming to like him best of the socons, so I don’t say that with any enthusiasm.)
9. On the other side of the table, Terry Branstad’s endorsement is Romney’s for the price of running a vigorous campaign in IA. (That I have on inside information.) Not that it is so hard to decipher. No Pawlenty. No Daniels. No Christie. Most of his staff backed Romney last time. If Romney will spend 5 days in IA in the next 5 weeks, Branstand will endorse, as will the rest of the pragmatic IA GOP.
10. As we will see in the next IA poll, Perry, Cain, Santorum, Gingrich, and Bachmann remain alive to split/fragment the socon vote in IA. That will mean that all of them have to stay there nearly non-stop for the next 12 weeks. That diminishes Perry’s time (as well as the rest) in NH, NV, and SC. Romney has only Huntsman to tangle with in NH and only a distracted Perry to deal with in NV. He also has SC largely to himself (as far as days in state go).
The shortened calendar reduces options and opportunities for all candidates and favor heavily the candidates who have already accumulated the name ID and fundraising. It is a battle between Perry (the corruptocrat) and Cain to see who comes out to a runoff with Romney.
October 9th, 2011 at 9:23 am
Good luck with Mitt Romney.
Link and then scroll down to the video AND WATCH THE WHOLE VIDEO (if you can bear to):
http://conservatives4palin.com/2011/10/tea-party-group-launches-affort-to-stop-romney-from-winning-gop-nomination.html
Again, good lick with Mitt!!!!!
lolololololololololol
October 9th, 2011 at 7:23 pm
25. Jack, I assume the video is a “flip-flop” attack. The message is clear. Romney’s opponents DO NOT want the American people to come to an understanding that abortion is the taking of a human life, nor do they want Americans to view anything in a conservative light. If the American people did that, they would be “flip-floppers.”
Romney’s opponents do not want the American people to support smaller government or a reduction in federal spending because that would be “flip-flopping.”
Hey, Jack. Palin was once unmarried, and then she decided to get married. She must be a flip-flopper.
October 9th, 2011 at 9:02 pm
Matt, I think you are onto something here about the need for reform in the management of the primary system. I was thinking along the lines of the second tuesday in Jan have the smallest 12 states vote all at once. The second tuesday of february would be 15 of the mid-size states all at once. The second tuesday of March would be the 15 of the big states voting all at once. Then in April have the 8 largest states vote everyother week two at a time. We will know who are nomine would be by the third week of May and hold the convention one to two weeks after the 4th of July. This gives us all of August, Sept, and Oct to campaign for the General. Small states have a say early, Large states have the final say, but no one group of states will determine the nominee. It allows money to not be such a factor in determining the best candidate while making the race more competitive.